Panasonic RC-6253 restoration

[Webster2703]

Hi,
I'm new to this forum. I joined because i bought a beatiful Panasonic RC-6253 flip clock. I already cleaned the outside of the clock and polished the plastic front to remove all the scratches (It almost looks like new now). I have started the restoration of the inner part of the clock but I ran into some problems.

1. The Bulb
It doesn't work, so i tried to replace it. In the picture you can see the old one on the left (wich surprisingly still works barely) and the new one (12V, 50mA) on the right. Sadly the new one didn't work so I measured the electricity on the cables. Strangely my measurement device showed me 218V and almost no Ampere at all (1mA). My clock is the european version and it runs on 220V. What kind of bulb do I need or do I have the right one and it just doesn't work?

2. The alarm
It starts at the wrong time and sometimes I can't even adjust it properly. I saw the flip clock fans video on YouTube about this clock, so maybe someone of you already owns this clock and can post a picture of the alarm mechanism. This would help me a lot.

3. The motor
It's a bit noisy, but it seems that the case can't be opened?


Anything you know about this could help me repairing it. Thank you very much!

Greetings from Germany,
Webster2703

[Mackey]

Some of these questions are hard or impossible to answer without seeing the clock in person.
Firstly, you need a NE-2 bulb (aka "lamp") that is rated for 220V and has a proper resistor. You'll have to look around, there are some on ebay
see listing
I don't think the above is exactly what you're looking for, but it's a start.

The alarm... again, no way to help you without seeing this in person unfortunately.

The motor ... some here have opened those up and reportedly fixed these, but only for some model ... but it's hit and miss.

I wish I had better new for you.

Mackey.

[Webster2703]

Some of these questions are hard or impossible to answer without seeing the clock in person.
Firstly, you need a NE-2 bulb (aka "lamp") that is rated for 220V and has a proper resistor. You'll have to look around, there are some on ebay
see listing
I don't think the above is exactly what you're looking for, but it's a start.

The alarm... again, no way to help you without seeing this in person unfortunately.

The motor ... some here have opened those up and reportedly fixed these, but only for some model ... but it's hit and miss.

I wish I had better new for you.

Mackey.

Thank You! I managed to find a bulb that matched your description and repaired my clock. I have given up on the alarm though, because I am not going to use it anyway. The motor was a lot of work but I got it opened, cleaned and back together. It's very quiet now. There is a picture below (The light isn't as bright as it seems).

[Mackey]

Great work. Thanks for the follow up.

[Flip_Time]

Hi Webster,

I have the same RC-6253. In fact, I have two of them now. I bought the second one because of the noisy motor in the first one. The motor in the second one is much quieter, but still not silent. The second clock is also running almost two minutes slow from an overnight test. The first clock keeps perfect time, but too noisy. What did you do to get the sealed motor open and how did you make it quiet once you did?

Regards,
Chris

[Webster2703]

Hi Flip_Time,

I have not dismantled the whole motor. The first thing I did was unscrew the motor from the clock mechanism and desolder the cable. After that I dismantled the plastic half of the motor and the gears in it. Now it gets a bit more complicated: I have attached another working motor to the drive train of the noisy motor with tape. I also removed the sticker on the bottom of the motor (there is a small hole under it). The idea is: 100% alcohol is dripped into the small hole of the noisy motor and then it is driven by the other motor so that the alcohol cleans the noisy motor from the inside. I'm not sure if you could just run the noisy motor with the alcohol inside by itself without getting a short circuit (although it should work, since 100% alcohol has no electrical conductivity). I repeated the whole thing a few times and always let the dirty alcohol drip out of it and then let the motor dry in between. After that I oiled and reassembled the gears in the plastic cover, soldered the cable back on and put the motor back in it's place. For me it worked extremely well (besides a really quiet hum, wich is normal), its was very loud before and now I can have my clock right next to my bed. I hope that helps.

(Sorry for grammar/spelling mistakes :o)

Webster2703